August 2014 Issue No 240 www.openhousescotland.co.uk £2.50

Hutting in Scotland: The place of religion in Crisis of the spiritual a space of our own? contemporary Scotland in modern culture Editorial Squeezing the middle

Why did the referendum not have an in-between option had its ups and downs but was steadily increasing in (devo-max as it came to be known) besides the stark numbers until the restoration of the Scottish Parliament options of yes or no to the question about Scottish in 1997 made it electable. independence? Legally the decision to allow a The other minority is broadly socialist or even Jacobin. referendum and the form it would take depended on Since the late 19th century Scotland has had more Westminster. David Cameron called it a Get Out Of Jail people voting further left than England. Gradually this card for Alex Salmond. The First Minister couldn’t has become the majority of Scottish voters. However it afford to argue. There was no guarantee he would be has only occasionally been part of a majority in re-elected in 2016. Westminster. What appears to be happening now is that Polls had indicated that the majority was happy with some are thinking that a majority in Holyrood might be devolution. This is what you expect - most people go enough. along with the status quo. This is how the referendum Churches tend to favour the status quo. None of them debate is being played out. Most are happy the way has given an opinion. But their members are divided. things are. A wit had pointed out that there was never a need for a No campaign. All the Unionist side had to Some historically minded Christians are influenced by say was nothing. It is possible that by opening their the Papal Treaty of Arbroath and the St. Andrews flag. mouths e.g. by offering more devolution, they have only They will vote for the restoration of full independence. disturbed the equilibrium. There is also a Christian Left as indicated by the The Yes campaign is the sum of two minorities. One is presence of Justice and Peace activists in all the broadly nationalist or Jacobite. It is worth remembering churches. They see independence as a step to social how far back this strand goes. The Saltire at change. On September 18 we will find out just now Bannockburn was first raised in 1807 - by Dumbarton’s much these two wings have been able to squeeze the Loyal Dixon Lodge. The Scottish National(ist) Party middle. Still roaming the earth

Many children go through a period of fascination with served us well. dinosaurs. The name, coined by English palaeontologist And according to Mark Hederman, Abbot of Glenstal Richard Owen in 1842 means ‘terrible, or powerful Abbey in Limerick, we have bred our own species of lizard’. Small boys, for a time, can reel off the dinosaur: the lumbering churches, banks and complicated names and characteristics of the monsters multinational companies which roam the earth today. who haunt their imaginations with great intensity. Then Unless a pioneering brainwave turns into a monster they move on to other things. sized dinosaur, he suggests, it has little hope of surviving Dinosaurs died out 66 million years ago, enabling the vicissitudes of history. Every large institution that mammals, including our own species, to diversify and means to survive on this earth has to become a evolve. A new study raises the possibility that the dinosaur. We may not like them, but we must learn to dinosaurs might have survived if an asteroid had not hit live with them. the earth at a time when the creatures were at their In his little book, Dancing with Dinosaurs, Abbot most vulnerable. Dr Steve Brusatte of Edinburgh Hederman offers a spirituality for the 21st century University told the BBC that the timing was ‘colossal which illuminates the steps on our road to resurrection bad luck’ for the dinosaurs. with the help of science and history. He sees the But as small boys know, dinosaurs never completely signature of the Trinity in the triune structure of our died out. The human brain is the product of 500 million brain. He reminds us that we are created with the years of evolution in vertebrates, and contains traces of built-in possibility of divine relationship, leading our primitive reptilian brain. In the first month of life, towards eventual divinisation. And that we need to for example, babies grasp any object that touches the include every aspect of ourselves in this transformation. palm of their hand – a reflex designed to help them The dinosaurs have their place in our story. hang on to something so that they don’t fall. Nature Dancing with Dinosaurs, by Mark Patrick Herderman, doesn’t readily give up a form of behaviour that has is published by The Columba Press, 2011

2 OPEN HOUSE August 2014 Contents Hutting in Scotland

LYNN JOLLY

3 A space of our own? Lynn Jolly A space of our own? 5 The place of religion in contemporary Scotland The movement to build a thousand huts in Scotland Anthony Allison received a boost in June when Scotland’s Planning Policy 7 Crisis of the spiritual Joe Fitzpatrick recommended that development plans make provision 9 Political bardology for huts for intermittent recreational occupation. Open Gerard Carruthers House arts editor reflects on comparisons being made 10 Celtic fringe with Scandinavia. Marian Pallister 12 In the footsteps of the saints Alison Clark One current trend sweeping the nation can comfortably afford such getaways is 14 Poverty and prospects for implores us to find a space of our own. an indication of the elevated GDP of their young people in Glasgow Built of timber and plotted in a woodland national economies. Certainly, there are Stephen J McKinney, Stuart clearing, it will be our escape from the Scots who enjoy the benefits of something city clamour and the pressures of the very similar but for the most part they will Hall, Kevin Lowden, Michele daily timetable. Our meditation cell or also be enjoying salaries upwards of £40k. McClung and Lauren Cameron. creative muse, it will provide our The other and perhaps more telling 16 The age of the laity weekends and summer days with a distinction is the impact of culture and Thomas A Fitzpatrick destination that is both physically tradition. It’s worth asking which reachable and spiritually aspirational. Scandinavians are most likely to take 17 Notebook The model upheld is that of the advantage of the rustic retreat option. Summer gatherings Scandinavian cabin to which people take Undoubtedly there will be exceptions but off from city and suburb at the end of for the most part they are unlikely to 19 Letters every week and every spring. There to include the more recently arrived Turkish Living Spirit enjoy the scent of pine and wood smoke, economic immigrants or Kosovan asylum 20 Reviews a view of the fjord, and the absence of seekers. The Norwegian ‘hytte’ is a long Books, film, music traffic, television and, implicitly, tension. established familial and social custom as This idyll is presented to us (mostly by much as it is a physical and geographical 24 Moments in time those who imagine an independent place. A bit like the English suburban Scotland as a messier version of Norway) garden, the North American porch or the as the element of life in these countries Australian gathering on the beach, it which provides an essential balance, represents a whole set of cultural Thank you to all those who contributing hugely to national happiness, assumptions and identities which are as contributed to this edition of health and general all-round cool. defining as they are appealing. In societies Open House. There are two factors consistently left in which a plurality of cultures is evident Open House, which was founded in out of this comparison: firstly, the the risk that the default preferences and Dundee in 1990, is an independent widespread economic prosperity of that practices of one become synonymous journal of comment and debate on part of Europe and, secondly, the with what is ‘good’, ‘healthy’ and, most significantly greater degree of ethnic and insidious of all, ‘normal’, is inherent to faith issues in Scotland. It is rooted in cultural homogeneity. The Swedish shop this kind of idealisation. If the only the reforms of the Second Vatican assistant or Norwegian office worker will people ‘hutting’ in Scandinavia are Council (1962-65) and committed to very probably own their woodland or ethnically Nordic there’s nothing wrong the dialogue which began at the waterside retreat but it is more likely to with that, but we should understand it Council - within the Catholic Church, match the UK estate agent’s description for what it is: a cultural tradition. in other churches, and with all those of ‘holiday lodge’: its resemblance to a This is not to disparage the movement committed to issues of justice and hut beginning and ending with the fact in this country which unquestionably peace. that it’s made of wood. Of course some offers the potential for a simpler and www.openhousescotland.co.uk are fairly basic (not all are equipped with more sustainable way of living, a fairer saunas and Jacuzzis) but even these are and more just distribution of land rights Cover photograph of Carbeth hut by likely to include hot showers, flushing and usage, and an improved physical and Morven Gregor. toilets and efficient solar powered psychological relationship with the generators. That those on the planet. The current Scottish context, Scandinavian version of a lower income however, demands more than a simplistic

August 2014 OPEN HOUSE 3 transference of custom and practice from across the North Sea. Certainly traditions have to begin somewhere, sometime, but their IGNATIAN SPIRITUALITY CENTRE growth and embedding usually depends on an organic spurt of enthusiasm rather than a ‘A Welcoming Space in the Heart of the City’ manufactured ideal. Arguably we are as likely to establish the Scandinavian version of the 2013 - 2014 Programme hutting tradition in the woodlands of Perthshire as we are to bring the French street The Bield at Blackruthven, Tibbermore, Perthshire, 14th-17th October 2014. market to Motherwell. The question is whether there is anything authentically A silent mid-week individually guided retreat, led by a Team from the Ignatian ‘Scottish’ about the current trend, and if there Spirituality Centre, in the beautiful Perthshire autumn time. Retreatants have is, how and in what direction it should be access to The Bield’s excellent facilities which include a chapel, art room, encouraged. swimming pool, labyrinth and extensive grounds. Accommodation is in single One example of how the practice has taken rooms (max 9 retreatants). Please book via the Ignatian Spirituality Centre for root in Scottish life lies just to the north of this retreat. Glasgow. There the hutters of Carbeth have established, over almost a hundred years, a settlement of huts originally preserved by, and COURSES – 2014 - 2015 for, the working class families of Glasgow and Clydebank as an escape from the effects of Growth in Prayer and Reflective Living: this course looks at different ways industrial life and, for a time, war. The of praying and becoming aware of everyday life as full of resources to strengthen Carbeth Hutters Company, recently established after a successful bid to buy the ourselves and others in our relationship with God. The course includes experience land, continue to take a noble stand against of different methods of prayer e.g. with Scripture (imaginative contemplation, any attempt to commercialise or profit by Lectio Divina), daily prayer, pictures, icons, nature, the universe, personal life, anyone owning a hut. The aim is that the huts story mantras, etc. Different traditions of Christian prayer/spirituality e.g. Celtic, continue to be accessible and affordable to the Ignatian, Franciscan – no expertise required. socio-economic groups that founded them rather than only to their more prosperous Spiritual Conversation: this course is complete in itself. It is intended to descendants. The reality is, however, that most huts are passed down through families and enhance listening skill and awareness of God’s presence in the many contacts those that can be bought, for an admittedly and conversations we have in our day to day lives. It is based in the Ignatian reasonable price, are still well beyond the tradition, drawing its inspiration from the Spiritual Exercises of St Ignatius of reach of the founders’ contemporary social Loyola. As a broad-based course it is expected that participants will find different counterparts. Residents of housing association uses for what they learn. flats in Drumchapel are unlikely to be able to afford the place in the woods that might have TASTER DAY – Saturday, 6th September 2014, 10.30am to 4.30pm been enjoyed by their great grandparents. For others, currently experimenting in Come along and see where we are and get a flavour of the different things we various nooks of the country, the hut is offer at the Ignatian Spirituality Centre. literally that: a one- person wooden wigwam, Themed and creative workshops; experiential reflective space, opportunities for free of electricity, gas and running water, heated by wood burner and designed for informal conversation. solitude, silence and whatever else you like to Come along and see us! do by yourself. Affordability and class are not the issues here: resilience and purpose are. Inter-Faith Dialogue: A series which has been set up to foster understanding The question posed by this disparate and respect among people of faith that will inspire that mutual respect and movement therefore is not whether we can understanding that fosters peace. Please see our website for dates and themes. create in the image of Scandinavia, but what it is we want to create at all: and who for. If a thousand huts for Scotland represents a Our New 2014-2015 Programme will soon be available by post or downloadable thousand attempts by Scottish residents to from our website, www.iscglasgow.co.uk, which has more information on the build an alternative to the consumptions of the events, course and retreats. For bookings or a copy of the programme contact: western economy with all its brutal social and spiritual consequences, that will be something The Administrative Secretary, Ignatian Spirituality Centre, worthy of a renewing country. The risk, if we only try to emulate, is that it becomes the 35 Scott Street, Glasgow, G3 6PE latest indulgence of the recycling urban middle Tel : 0141 354 0077 • Fax : 0141 331 4588 classes. e-mail: [email protected] • Website: www.iscglasgow.co.uk For more information about hutting in Scotland go to www.thousandhuts.org Registered Charity SCO 40490 & 230165 (See Notebook, page 18)

4 OPEN HOUSE August 2014 Faith and belief

ANTHONY ALLISON The place of religion in contemporary Scotland

An academic who led a research project into faith and belief in Scotland sets out the context for the study and outlines one of its key recommendations.

In June 2013, the Scottish Secular religion and a reference to religion Society petitioned, unsuccessfully, to includes a reference to a lack of have religious observance removed religion.’ (2) ‘Belief means any from schools. In January 2014, the religious or philosophical belief and a Church of Scotland’s Church and reference to belief includes a reference Society Council worked with the to a lack of belief’. These definitions Humanist Society Scotland to produce are articulated in such a manner as to a joint declaration for changing be as inclusive as possible. Specifically, ‘religious observance’ in schools to the phrase ‘lack of religion’ and ‘lack ‘time for reflection.’ The proposal was, of belief’ are intended to provide however, largely rejected by the protection to people of no religion. grassroots of both the Church of Precisely what can be considered Scotland and the Humanist Society ‘religion’ and ‘belief’ is, however, left Scotland. This year the Scottish up to the courts. As such, the actual Government passed legislation that minority religions either remained the understanding of these categories is an legalised same-sex marriage for the same, or showed small percentage emerging area that is continually first time in Scotland: this elicited a increases. evolving on the basis of judicial plethora of responses from different The Equality Unit of the Scottish rulings. In particular, there tends to be religious communities. Similarly, this Government, appreciating these much debate surrounding what year has also seen a number of changing demographics, sought to constitutes the belief category. For vigorous debates surrounding the better understand the relationship example, Mr Tim Nicholson was the place, if any, of religion in any between religion and non-religion in head of sustainability at Grainger, the potential future Scottish Constitution. contemporary Scottish Society by UK’s largest listed residential company, At their core, these discussions have commissioning the project Faith and and claimed to hold deep differing understandings of the place Belief Scotland. This project was philosophical beliefs about climate of religion within contemporary carried out by the University of change. When his boss left his mobile Scottish society, and, by extension, the Edinburgh and was among the first of phone in London while on a business nature and place of non-religion. It is its kind to critically engage with the trip to Ireland, he ordered one of his likely such public debates will continue religion-non-religion interface. The staff to fly over to Ireland and deliver to arise given the nature of Scotland’s results were based on focus groups it to him. For Nicholson, this act was changing demographics. For example, with 178 people across Scotland and not just an act of decadent indulgence the 2011 Scotland Census results on an online, nationwide survey of 1400 but rather symptomatic of the long- religion revealed 54% of people people; its findings were presented to a standing contempt with which his boss self-identified with Christianity and diverse audience at the Scottish held his beliefs about climate change. 37% self-identified with no religion. Parliament in June 2014 and are In 2009, Nicholson’s beliefs about Those self-identifying with no religion available via an interactive map on the climate change were legally were also the group that saw the project’s website. acknowledged and were therefore largest growth from the 2001 to 2011 given legal protection akin to religion. Census – an increase of 9%. In the Definitions This 2009 ruling (Grainger plc v same period, by contrast, those According to the Equality Act 2010, Nicholson) set the legal precedent that self-identifying with Christianity saw a religion and belief as defined as subsequently enabled the political decrease of 11% and most other followed: (1) ‘Religion means any beliefs of Cornelius Olivier to also be

August 2014 OPEN HOUSE 5 recognized as a philosophical belief Additional comments on this majority of 59% of respondents felt and thus accorded legal protection included: ‘disbelief (a chosen option that their beliefs were poorly akin to religious belief (Olivier v not to believe) is not the same as lack understood by their wider Department for Work and Pensions, of belief (too lazy/thoughtless/inept) community. An overwhelming 2013). to consider the matter and make an majority of 76% further felt that it In both cases, the criteria used by informed choice’; ‘atheism is not a was important for their wider the courts to discern what constituted lack of religion nor is it religion. It is community to have at least some ‘belief’ was that: the belief must be a secular belief and should be titled as understanding of their perspective. genuinely held; it must be a belief, not such or something similar’; ‘in this Equally, the survey also revealed a an opinion or viewpoint based on the case “lack of belief” is an almost willingness and appetite amongst present state of information available; impossible position since one finds both people of religion and non- it must be a weighty and substantial that almost everyone has a belief religion to improve knowledge of system albeit they do not recognize it aspect of human life and behavior; it their position in their wider must attain a certain level of cogency, or acknowledge it’. community and to learn about others: seriousness, cohesion and importance; Nonetheless, despite these a majority of 73% expressed a it must be worthy of respect in a definitional problems, the Equality willingness to improve the democratic society, not be Act’s understanding of religion and understanding of their position in the incompatible with human dignity, and belief seeks to balance the rights of wider community. Similarly, a not conflict with the fundamental people of religion and non-religion. majority of 53% expressed a desire to rights of others. And it is in human rights language In consultation with humanist and that much of the present public learn more about other religions and secular organisations, humanism and debate is framed. However, at times non-religions. secularism are referred to as ‘belief’ this public discourse has neglected the With such research findings in mind, for this study (see page 13 of the reality that human rights are often the report warns that there runs a report). While it was acknowledged ‘qualified’ rights. So, for example, potential risk of a ‘new sectarianism’ that this is unsatisfactory for many while one has the ‘freedom to developing. Sectarianism thrives on humanists and secularists, it was felt manifest one’s religion or beliefs’, and exclusivity, lack of mutual that under the Equality Act 2010 this includes non-religion (i.e., understanding, and stereotyping. This definitions, the clause ‘philosophical ‘belief’), they are ‘subject only to such report found polarised social attitudes belief’ provided grounds for this. We limitations as are prescribed by law between people of religion and asked respondents to comment on and are necessary in a democratic non-religion which existed alongside these Equality Act 2010 definitions of society in the interests of public a majority, across the board, feeling religion and belief. safety, for the protection of public that they were poorly understood by Concerning religion, 44% of order, health or morals, or for the their wider communities. Accordingly, respondents thought that the protection of the rights and freedoms the report calls for increased dialogue definition of religion meaning ‘any of others’ (Article 9.2, Human Rights across the religious-humanist-secular religion and a reference to religion Act 1998, emphasis my own). The divide with a view to help fostering includes a reference to a lack of question is how we go about increased levels of mutual religion’ to be useful, in contrast to balancing these competing human understanding. In doing so, it is 43% who did not. Additional rights in present public discourse? hoped that mutual understanding will comments on this included: Interestingly, the data collected by be improved and that, as result, the ‘nonsensical to refer to ‘a lack of this project raised some serious nature of contemporary public religion’ as a definition of religion’; ‘a questions about the nature of this discourse between people of religion lack of religion is a lack of religion. public discourse. and non-religion might transition Being an atheist person, I feel For example, participants were from one presently characterised as disregarded and patronised when I asked about a range of social issues talking at each other, to one that can am told by a legal document that my such as abortion, euthanasia, same- be characterised as talking to each lack of religion is my religion’; ‘the sex marriage, etc. A statistical other. phrase “lack of religion” suggests a analysis of respondents found that deficit perspective that promotes social attitudes between people of religion as the norm’. religion and non-religion were Dr Anthony Allison (Twitter: @ Concerning belief, 50% of polarised. For example, 60% of antallison1) is an academic respondents thought that the non-religious respondents thought specialising in Christian-Muslim definition of belief as meaning ‘any that faith schools have a negative relations at the University of religious or philosophical belief and a impact upon Scottish society. By Edinburgh and was lead researcher reference to belief includes a reference contrast, 57% of religious on Faith and Belief Scotland. Full to a lack of belief’ to be useful, in respondents disagreed. And yet results available via: www. contrast to 38% who did not. despite such polarised results, a faithandbeliefscotland.co.uk

6 OPEN HOUSE August 2014 Spirituality and culture

JOE FITZPATRICK Crisis of the spiritual

In the second of three articles, a retired educationalist analyses the demise of the spiritual in modern culture.

In a recent article in Open House which I have outlined is alien to much antiquated explanatory framework (May 2014) I attempted to account of modern culture. There are not a which modern science has rendered for the spiritual dimension of the few philosophies today which regard obsolete. Much of modern science is human personality by identifying it in women and men as no more than the preoccupied with our drive for particular with two basic and sum total of their purely physical survival and, with it, our biological conscious human orientations – our attributes. This form of Physicalism drives and impulses, our purely orientation to the truth and our holds, for example, that human physical orientations. The approach orientation to the right, our consciousness is nothing more than being advocated here has no wish to intellectual and moral striving. And I the firing of neurons in the brain, that diminish or deny any of this. But I linked the success of such striving with the mind is simply a code word for would suggest that modern society what I called the question of God, certain operations of the central tends to go overboard in its since the existence of an intelligible nervous system. Then again, since preoccupation with biological and universe and of an objective moral Darwin we have become accustomed physical explanations of human order seems to me to require some to explanations of human behaviour conduct and has tended to neglect the kind of explanation. I might have entirely in terms of our hunter- other human drives, such as the drive added that the orientations I gatherer forebears, as mere for the truth and the drive for what is mentioned are not simply and inertly expressions of the struggle for physical morally right; and, in the final there; they have to be cultivated and survival, and so forth. In other words, analysis, our desire for God. supported, and that is why the places many of our educated contemporaries The effect of modern science on a where intellectual development is see any explanation of human beings people’s spiritual self-understanding promoted - schools and colleges - need and of human behaviour in terms of and relationship with their also to be places where sound moral spiritual categories as outdated, environment is well illustrated in the values are inculcated and nurtured. outmoded, as harking back to an case of the indigenous tribes of North Intellectual development cannot take America. All of these tribes had rich place in a moral vacuum but only and complex mythologies, stories occurs if qualities such as honesty, which purported to answer many of courage and perseverance are also Modern society tends to go life’s great questions: of how the encouraged and promoted. Children overboard in its world came to be, of how the sun and young adults need to learn to relates to the earth, of how the moon respect evidence and to adjust their preoccupation with biological was born, of how man should relate intellectual judgments to the range and physical explanations of to the gods, nature and the other and quality of the evidence they put human conduct and has animals, of the meaning of eclipses, of forward to support these judgments. the correct relations between man and Some judgments will be certain, others tended to neglect the other woman or between children and their only probable and some may be less human drives, such as the parents, of their past victories over secure than this. You cannot talk drive for the truth and the their enemies etc. The myths were about intellectual development while stories that explained things and in so leaving moral qualities and habits drive for what is morally doing created a people’s mental – virtues, in old fashioned language – right; and, in the final landscape, provided them with an such as honesty and fair-mindedness analysis, our desire for God. identity as a people, furnishing the out of account. young with a mental and emotional Now the notion of the spiritual structure that bonded them with their

August 2014 OPEN HOUSE 7 ancestors and the other tribe members is the only thesis I wish to put and also provided them with a map forward. If that thesis can be accepted, and compass to guide them when There is no possibility of then it follows that there is, indeed, a confronted by important life decisions. science going away, of the crisis in modern society, a spiritual They were at once intellectual and global market economy void, which capitalism seeks to fill emotional, explanatory and satisfying. with the pursuit of ‘fun’, with drugs But with the incursion of the white ceasing to operate, of things and pornography – surely much more man that mental world was reverting to the way they an unbridled pursuit in our ‘advanced’ demolished. society than in many we regard as Not only were the native Americans once were. Nor should we ‘primitive’ – with Mickey Mouse and – the ‘Indians’ – a defeated people get too sentimental about Disneyland, haute couture, advertising who suffered horrendously from the the old ways. and endless, endless consumerism. diseases imported by the white man; This is not meant as a diatribe against not only were many of them corrupted the modern but as an accurate and seduced by bribes and false diagnosis of what we encounter day in and day out in our modern culture. promises and ruined by alcohol, mythologies and their replacement by And the point I am stressing is that hitherto unknown among them; but scientific rationalism, the mental much of what people everywhere are their mental world, their conceptual landscapes of whole peoples have doing when they engage in these systems, their explanations of the been hollowed out, their emotional ‘glamorous’ pursuits is trying to fill universe and everything in it, also lay structures, provided by the old sagas the void left by the destruction of the in ruins. Science had put the old and stories, have been broken up, old myths. mythologies to the sword. New, ground into powder and blown to the So the thesis so far reads as follows: rational explanations were now four corners of the earth. Science has we are spiritual beings, who yearn for available about the sun and its destroyed the life sustaining myths, the truth, the good and, in the final relation to the earth, about the moon the stories people lived by, which gave analysis, for God. The stories that and the meaning of eclipses, for structure and direction to their lives. sustained us in this yearning, which example. This new form of At the same time, capitalist social guided our orientation and satisfied it, rationalism had little sympathy with organisation has destroyed the have in many cases been destroyed. stories, myths, that purported to tell rhythms of traditional life, the liturgy While we can still read them we are us how the universe operated and at of the seasons; it has destroyed the no longer capable of deriving from the the same time attempted to guide and possibility of people living the myths old sagas and stories the sustenance direct human behaviour; in this new, in their own forms of social that people once did: that is our fate rationalist world the claims of these organisation and in the rhythms of as ‘scientific people.’ What is more, stories to have any cognitive value their daily lives. there is no going back. Science is here were called in question. And with the Now there is no possibility of science to stay. We may attempt to fill the arrival of capitalism on the heels of going away, of the global market void, to answer the yearnings of our technology a whole new set of values economy ceasing to operate, of things spirit, with the pursuit of ‘fun’, and so was imposed, old moral norms and reverting to the way they once were. forth, but ultimately all such attempts categories were dismissed as outdated, Nor should we get too sentimental are doomed to failure. They are and relationships came to be built on about the old ways for there is no simply not commensurate with the commercial trade and the cash nexus. question that most of the third, void, they are not adequate to satisfy What I have described, however ‘underdeveloped’ world wants to the deep spiritual ache. briefly and inadequately, is not only catch up with the ‘developed world’ In a third and final article on this true of the Indians of North America and enjoy the benefits of science so far theme I shall attempt to demonstrate but applies also to other regions of the denied them. There is, it would how and why modern culture’s world now feeling the full force of this appear, no going back. What I wish to spiritual crisis is Christianity’s harsh new rationalism accompanied call attention to here is the price – the opportunity. by the imposition of new capitalist spiritual price – which modern science values. It is also true of Europe and has demanded of human beings, some Joe Fitzpatrick is a former inspector of the so-called ‘developed world’, albeit of whom are eager, others reluctant, to schools and author of The Fall and these parts of the globe have had be inducted into the new scientific Ascent of Man: How Genesis longer to come to terms with the new culture. That there is such a price and Supports Darwin, University Press of realities. With the defeat of the old that it takes the form I have sketched America, 2012.

8 OPEN HOUSE August 2014 Burns and the referendum

GERARD CARRUTHERS A guide to political bardology

To all those who claim that Burns would be on their side in the independence referendum, a Burns expert provides a guide to political bardology.

Robert Burns is the most portable of projected his administration changing sides of the house in Westminster writers, and it is no surprise that Alex tack on tuition fees only when ‘the Palace, and the 1999 sing-along Salmond should carry him rocks melt wi’ the sun’. This is a very saluted the compelling myth of everywhere. Burns, the great oracle of astute retreading of Burns’s greatest Scotland being basically more Scottish emotion, is a formidable love-song, a very familiar riff for a egalitarian than England. rhetorical resource in a nationalist wide section of the Scottish populace To a Mouse: In January this year politician’s locker. It allows the First and a novel use of the same. Mr Mr Salmond mocked David Cameron Minister to pour forth a plethora of Salmond is masterly here in applying by comparing the British premier to recognisable, ready-made passionate Scottish feeling to the undeniable Burns’s eponymous mouse, a ‘cowrin, utterances at a time when nationalism cultural, economic and social good tim’rous beastie ... [with] a panic in is being canny not to seem too hot- that is education. thy breastie’. While Mr Cameron headed, wants to be seen to be about A Man’s a Man: At the opening of refuses to enter debate he is seen as rationality and practicality. the Scottish Parliament in 1999 there running scared. But if he courageously Such a Parcel of Rogues in a was the slightly curious spectacle of agrees to a public dual with the First Nation: The account of the Union of singer Sheen Wellington leading all Minister, going back on his own Parliaments of 1707 known to most sides of the chamber (Conservative, contention that this is a discussion for Scots, comes via this song by Burns. Green, Labour, Liberal Democrat, the Scottish people, he will be painted This text claims that via dodgy deals Scottish Socialist Party, SNP and one as meddling in affairs in which he has between the peers of Scotland and Independent) in a rousing version of no ultimate say, or at least no vote. England, the Scottish nation was Burns’s song of contempt for class- We might, however, also wonder over ‘bought and sold for English gold’. based society: the sentiments of the second stanza Advantage to a few and the economic which begins: Ye see yon birkie ca’d a Lord disadvantage of the many (for Wha struts, an’ stares, an’ a’ that I’m truly sorry man’s dominion, instance, over North Sea oil) have Tho’ hundreds worship at his word Has broken nature’s social union, been familiar tropes in Scottish He’s but a coof for a’ that Is a Yes vote another breaking of a politics and literature for the past For a’ that, an’ a’ that long standing and successful ‘social three centuries. Mr Salmond says His ribband, star, an a’ that union’ where Scots have the benefit of Burns would have been a Yes voter The man o’ independent mind the British Welfare State and the but it is difficult to be certain as Burns He looks an’ laughs at a’ that Barnett Formula which allegedly never had a vote on anything, being provides for Scotland out of one of the majority of the A song of the 1790s following the proportion to its productivity? Or, as disenfranchised in eighteenth-century French Revolution and hymning Mr Salmond contends, with a shared Britain. ‘democracy’ when this was a suspect currency, monarchy and other A Red Rose: In Scotland home word, possibly to a majority of common institutions Scotland and students do not pay tuition fees in contemporary British England will become much better higher education. Citing Scotland’s parliamentarians. Even as it looked friends and neighbours? Succeeding ‘Bard’ in a widely reported speech at backward, the Holyrood performance Chancellors of the Exchequer, Alistair the opening of the refurbished Burns registered Scotland as a most modern Darling (leader of the Better Together Birthplace Museum in Alloway in European polity. It is impossible to campaign) and George Osborne, have 2011, the Scottish First Minister imagine such a song being sung by all been quick to counter Burnsian

August 2014 OPEN HOUSE 9 The church in Argyll and the Isles (1) sentiment about ‘social union’ and MARIAN PALLISTER scotch the idea that a shared currency would be practical.

For Auld Lang Syne: ‘Should auld acquaintance be forgot/And never Celtic fringe brought to mind’. Wait for deployment by both the Yes In the first of two dispatches from Scotland’s most westerly campaign and Better Together at dioceses, a justice and peace activist in the Catholic Church midnight on 17th September 2014 finds local links to global justice. before the referendum polling stations open the next day. To a Mouse (again) I’m not sure how it happened, but I Lewis or Portree in Skye. I may Och! I backward cast my e’e am SCIAF’s Ambassador for the speak at three Masses during such diocese of Argyll and the Isles – and weekends, but that probably adds On prospects drear! the Justice and Peace Commissioner another 60 to 100 miles (or a An’ forward, tho’ I canna see, for the diocese. If nothing else, the another ferry journey) to the travel. I guess an’ fear! two voluntary posts have given me That’s life for us all – rural an insight into the challenges faced parishes may have radii of between The first two lines here might be both by parish priests and by their 14 and 40 miles; in urban areas written for the ‘Yes’ campaign, the congregations. there is rarely more than one last two for ‘Better Together’. If together we make up the Body parish, and the parish priest may be of the Church, our diocese can only required to minister to distant Scots Wha Hae: Burns song be the Church’s shaggy Celtic communities. In Oban, the priest at celebrating Scottish martial prowess fringe. The diocese stretches from the cathedral takes a ferry to Mull of Robert the Bruce and the Battle of the Butt of Lewis to the Mull of every Sunday afternoon to celebrate Kintyre. Islands and long Mass in Craignure; the parish priest Bannockburn in 1314. 2014 has been peninsulas separated by fiord-like in Portree celebrates Mass in a brave choice by Mr Salmond for fingers of water that must have Broadford on Saturday evenings, the referendum, with its anniversary made the Vikings feel very at home Portree on Sunday mornings, of English-beating and, during their three hundred year followed by Mass at Dornie on the simultaneously, the commemoration rule, when our bishop was based in mainland. And in Stornoway, the Trondheim. parish priest follows Mass there of the outbreak of World War I in Today, Oban is where the bishop’s with one in Harris on Sunday which so many Scots were seat is situated, a halfway house afternoons. Even in my own parish slaughtered for ‘King and Empire’. that can be reached by ferry and by of St Margaret’s, Lochgilphead, Burns’s part in that conflagration was road. It perhaps says much that in where Mass is at 10am on Sundays, the first part of the 20th century, Fr David Connor then travels to formed by the use on recruitment Argyll’s county councillors met in Inveraray for a 12.30 Mass. posters of his rousing I’ll go and be a the Central Hotel in Glasgow These ‘wee jaunts’ can be from 20 Sodger (in the British army). Writers because that was an equitable and to 50 miles distant – round trips clearly have more imagination than easier place for them all to get to that are a little longer than the politicians. – and when we have our diocesan ‘sabbath walk’ referred to in Acts 1: choir weekends, we go to St Mary’s 12-14. Monastery at Kinnoull, Perth, for And of course, this can make Professor Gerard Carruthers is Chair much the same reasons. ‘parish life’ a little different from of Scottish Literature since 1700 and Each of Scotland’s dioceses faces that experienced by urban Co-Director for the Centre for challenges unique to itself. When I Catholics. Robert Burns Studies at the visit parishes during Lent on behalf Parishioners who make an 80 of SCIAF, I may be away from miles round trip to attend Mass University of Glasgow. This article Friday night until Monday morning may find it difficult for many first appeared in The Guardian – just getting to and from my home reasons to make that journey again online. in Mid Argyll to Stornoway in for a meeting at church.

10 OPEN HOUSE August 2014 If that sounds a bit negative, think issues. There is an active group that again. meets regularly in support of What impresses me most wherever I prisoners of conscience and travel in the diocese is the dedication correspondence with prisoners of in every parish to a wide range of causes that fit into our Catholic conscience of all faiths and none is social teaching. There may not be a undertaken by the whole parish label of ‘Justice and Peace’ or every Christmas. ‘SCIAF’ on the work that’s being Take a ferry to Benbecula and Fr done, but that is not to say that St Maolrubha, Skye, a chapel Ross Crichton will tell you that his praying for, giving to and acting on converted from a byre on the shores parish supports Mary’s Meals and Fr issues that relate to Justice and Peace of the island. are not happening. Colin MacInnes’s work in Ecuador. We have missionaries who work in In Skye, parishioners are involved South America and elsewhere. We But sometimes we have to look to with an organisation called Helping the cities for advice on how to tackle have links with street kids in Hands, which gives out food parcels new problems. Aggressive rounding Zambia. Explain what the focus of to poor families at Christmas, and this year’s SCIAF campaign is and in up of migrant workers in places such the Skye Food Bank. There are boxes every parish, someone will approach as Campbeltown, Rothesay, you after Mass to say they have an Lochgilphead and Inveraray is an at the back of the Portree church for auntie who is a Sister in Ethiopia or issue that has shaken us, especially as this – a reminder that poverty is not an uncle who is a priest in Columbia. parish priests and parishioners in just an urban problem. these areas witnessed arrests. We Global justice and peace issues are This is a diocese that encompasses can’t dispute the legality of the often pursued because of such local Arran, Bute, the Inner and Outer links. arrests and deportations, but we Hebrides, and all of mainland Argyll And when there’s a problem on our want to act to ensure human dignity doorstep, we move on it – even and we’ve sought advice from Justice (as well as pockets of other counties though our ‘doorstep’ is a tad larger and Peace Scotland on how to move to the north). The challenges than most. forward on the problem. throughout this Celtic fringe change So what do we do in the sticks? from parish to parish, and perhaps Let me take you on a quick guided what is meant when we talk about tour round a couple of mainland ‘Rural’ doesn’t mean ‘idyllic’. It parishes and a couple of island poverty, immigration, health and just means a different kind of parishes. wellbeing, youth issues and reality – and that includes Dunoon has a Justice and Peace education, stewardship of the earth, group, but less formally and very and the effects of weapons of mass poverty and discrimination, generously it supports SCIAF, the destruction (which we have on our Mthunzi and Lilanda Initiative just as it does in the city. doorstep), are not quite what you (which supports the education of vulnerable children in Zambia), and mean if you live in Glasgow, Dundee, a range of local issues. Aberdeen, or even in a village in the ‘Rural’ doesn’t mean ‘idyllic’. It just St Margaret’s, Lochgilphead and its diocese of Motherwell, where ‘our’ means a different kind of reality – satellite parish in Inveraray also bishop has recently moved. supports the work of SCIAF and the and that includes poverty and Our strategies have to be a little discrimination, just as it does in the Mthunzi & Lilanda Initiative, and different, but we can be just as city. We’ve got food banks. We’ve MOMA (Moving on Mid Argyll, a got organisations helping folk who charity that helps homeless people to effective in meeting the demands of are homeless. We have drugs and sex progress). The parish is collaborating our social teaching. And just watch and rock’n’roll messing up the same ecumenically on green issues, has us when we start meeting by Skype - sort of percentages of lives as representatives at the gates of who knows what we’ll achieve! happens in areas where it is perhaps Faslane for landmark protests, and more ‘expected’. Police sniffer dogs because of its location (Lochgilphead routinely get on the service buses has an internationally acclaimed Marian Pallister is a writer and taking people home from Glasgow to psychiatric hospital), the parish is journalist and former lecturer at all parts of our diocese. closely involved in mental health Napier University in Edinburgh.

August 2014 OPEN HOUSE 11 The church in Argyll & The Isles (2)

ALISON CLARK In the footsteps of the saints

An officer in the Scottish Episcopal Church recalls the legacy of the Celtic saints and reflects on the diversity of worshipping communities in the highlands and islands today.

I work for the Scottish Episcopal the seafront and St John’s Episcopal This year, our theme is Reflection for Diocese of Argyll & The Isles, Cathedral on the Main Street. St Action, a time in which we are invited planning and leading a development Columba is honoured in the latter by both individually and as programme which seeks to resource a remarkable piece of stained glass art congregations to deepen our spiritual congregations for mission by and the principal Celtic saints are practice to underpin and direct our encouraging spiritual growth at commemorated in the names of the mission. Facilitators will lead individual and congregational level. Cathedral Choir Stalls. congregational groups in submitting This includes the training of lay There is considerable interest in the their activities to the discipline of people as worship leaders and history of the church in the area, both scriptural reflection and prayer. In the pastoral visitors, in partnership with the Jacobite connection and the longer run, each charge will be asked the local priest in charge. ancient ‘Celtic connection’. A curious for a simple mission plan. This all A job that takes me from Lewis to example would be the The staff of St sounds great on paper but like any Campbeltown, from Iona to Moluag, known as the ‘bachuil’ other initiative, it is messier on the Kinlochleven - what’s not to like? which is kept on the island of Lismore ground! Fortunately I can sleep in any in the hands of the custodian, the There are obvious practical comfortable bed and my suitcase Baron of Bachuil. A Latin Charter of challenges of working in an area that opens itself when I pull it out of the 1544, still held by the family, runs from the Butt of Lewis to cupboard. Some months it’s not confirmed immemorial possession of Campbeltown, eastwards to Fort worth putting it away at all. My life their lands and the Magnum Baculum William and south to Cowal. There is nomadic and always interesting. of Saint Moluag. The Lyon court are theological challenges presented When I reflect on the ferry trips, car confirmed this in 1950 and the by the sustainability of tiny journeys and indeed flights involved, pastoral staff was returned from congregations and the crisis in I think of the early saints - and no Inveraray to Lismore in 1974. ordinations, a challenge that is doubt their servants! - travelling on Fascinating though this is, how does experienced across the Christian foot by land, and overseas in open it relate to the mission of the church denominations. boats. Much tougher physically but in the here and now? Why do people There is a diversity in our was life harder or easier in other attend church and why do they not? worshipping communities which puts ways? What do they and we believe the paid to any stereotypical assumptions There is only one tiny difference church is for? about religion in the highlands and between the titles of the Catholic and For the last three years we have been islands. In Harris the episcopal Episcopalian dioceses - the Roman exploring such questions through our congregation hosts ecumenical bible Catholic Diocese of Argyll and the diocesan Building the Vision studies. On North Uist, the Isles and ours: we use a capital ‘T’. In programme. The name derives from Congregation of St Brendan the spite of the obvious differences, we an exercise early in the process where Navigator meets in the home of its have much in common. We share a people were asked to identify their female priest. On Raasay, however, love of the heritage and history of the church’s gifts from the past and the the lay led episcopal congregation saints and the challenges of our present and to record the foundation cannot meet in the village hall on a particular geography. of their trust as they looked to the Sunday but must worship on a St Columba is of course a cherished future. They wrote on cardboard weekday because to open the hall is saint for us both in Oban. St ‘bricks’ to represent what their vision regarded as breaking the Sabbath. (I Columba’s RC cathedral stands on was built on. am reminded of Desmond Tutu’s

12 OPEN HOUSE August 2014 frustrated question ‘What Gospel are Iona where many come for spiritual challenging. they reading?’) sustenance, some not knowing exactly For my part I have been challenged Currently the two vacant charges in what they are seeking but with a and tested by working for a the outer isles are looked after by spiritual hunger which is evident mainstream denomination in a part of ordained religious sisters from among many these days. How are we Scotland where Dunoon or different Anglican orders. (Is it to meet this and who is to carry it Stornoway constitute a metropolis. coincidence that there are religious out? Seeking to inspire and encourage women drawn to the islands leading a I referred above to the crisis in where it can seem as though church very intentional life of prayer, in some ordained ministry, a crisis evident membership is about the comfort of a cases as members of religious orders?) across the board denominationally. In club rather than the place where we Our mainland churches are more the Scottish Episcopal Church (SEC) are resourced to be ‘Christ for the conventional and yet even they vary we too experience the problem of world’ can be frustrating. I am, considerably in ecclesiology and tone. small congregations who cannot - or though, regularly humbled by In a large city, an Episcopalian may do not believe they can - sustain a discovering examples of loving be able to choose to worship priest or indeed a share of one. A service, faithful commitment and real according to his or her theological renewed interest in the role of the love of God. When it gets down to it, and ecclesiological leanings. That laity may be prompted by we cannot proclaim the Gospel if we choice is not open in small towns circumstances but merits theological have not been touched by it ourselves. where there is only one Episcopal exploration for its own sake. Our I am reminded that faith is expressed church. Yet this very constraint forces diocese is an example of this blend of in many ways. The hospitality and us to rub along with each other, not necessity and intentional choice. Lay table fellowship that characterises always agreeing but maintaining a people are active in a variety of roles. many of our gatherings is more than kenspeckle sort of unity which is Some have undertaken tasks because mere sociability. Always though, celebrated joyfully at our diocesan the ‘local’ priest had several activity needs to be submitted to synod. congregations to cover. Others theological reflection in order to test Divided by water as well as land we respond to a vocational call and are whether it is indeed an expression of use phone conferencing and Skype in invited to serve in a variety of God’s work in the world and not order to overcome the challenges of capacities. My sense is that across the merely the pursuit of our own wishes distances. This is limited by the Province of the SEC there is a similar and habits however worthy. patchy nature of broadband and by ‘mixed economy’. When I become frustrated working our own expertise. With certain I have read with interest the papers within an institution and indeed notable exceptions, church members from the Open House conference on within a tiny part of it which is both are not likely to be ‘early adopters’ of the role of the laity. It reminded me of hothouse - close and attenuated new technology. a quotation I came across. Hans across distance, I am chastened and The practical challenge as an Ruedi Weber says: revived by the people I meet. I pull educator is to gather a group large ‘The laity are not the helpers of the out that suitcase and set off again. In enough and with enough in common clergy so that the clergy can do their her book Practicing Resurrection, in any one location. For a number of job...but the clergy are the helpers of Nora Gallagher says: ‘It is when I fall years, we tackled this by establishing the whole people of God, so that the in love again with God’s people that a group that met face to face twice a laity can be the church’. they help me to fall in love afresh year and virtually by phone My own faith journey has included with God’. conference the rest of the time. We involvement in the base Christian undertook some basic biblical and community movement and in feminist Alison Clark is Congregational theological study and at other times theology groups in the UK and Learning and Development Officer we ‘met’ as a virtual book group. Scotland. In the community for the Episcopal Diocese of Argyll It is important to keep re-visiting the movement, clergy, religious and lay all and The Isles. A facilitator, coach and purpose of our activities. The ancient met, talked and worshipped together writer, she lived in a small intentional saints had a clear mission to make so the concept as expressed by Weber Christian community in the 1980s. A converts to Christianity. We are called makes sense to me. For those clergy Glaswegian by birth, she now lives on to be missionaries of the Gospel in a and lay whose experience has been of the Isle of Bute. She is the author of society which has been described as a more traditional pattern - in both How to Stop Flogging a Dead Horse. post - Christian. Both of our our denominations – such an The views expressed in this article are denominations have a presence on understanding is likely to be those of the writer.

August 2014 OPEN HOUSE 13 Child poverty

STEPHEN J MCKINNEY, STUART HALL, KEVIN LOWDEN, MICHELE MCCLUNG AND LAUREN CAMERON. Poverty and prospects for young people in Glasgow

A previous article discussed the effects of child poverty on education across the world and in the UK (Open House, March 2014). Here a group of academics report on surprising findings from research focused on Scotland.

Our research examined the impact of higher in areas of deprivation). The education, we attributed this finding poverty on initial positive school tripartite measure refined the to the position of Catholic schools in leaver destinations (Higher Education, measurement of child poverty and was the state education system. Catholic Further Education, employment and compared to the initial school leaver schools have full state funding and are training opportunities) in Glasgow destinations for young people in 28 entitled to the same levels of funding, secondary schools. The results of the mainstream, comprehensive secondary Local Authority and government research are surprising and provide schools in Glasgow over a three year support as are non-denominational grounds for optimism of a viable period 2006-2009. We excluded the schools. future for many young people; but small Gaelic school and the schools To explore the factors contributing must be treated with a degree of for young people with special needs. to the statistical findings, we visited caution. The results were surprising: the five schools across the city with Our aim was to research the statistical comparison confirmed that similar rates of child poverty but association between child poverty and there is no clear association between varying rates of success in initial initial positive school leaver levels of poverty and success in initial school leaver destination. We destinations in Glasgow secondary school leaver destinations (higher interviewed a number of key schools. Glasgow experiences some of levels of poverty and deprivation were personnel in each school (e.g. Schools the highest levels of poverty in the not necessarily linked with lower leaders, Principal teachers, Careers country (45% of the 5% most success rates for the school). A more Officers). The results of this research deprived areas nationally and a free sophisticated comparison that are extensive and we provide a school meal average significantly excluded Higher Education (a summary of some salient points (fuller higher than the Scottish figure). As we minority of pupils from all Glasgow reports are identified at the end of the began this work, we were concerned schools go onto Higher Education) article). We will now outline some of about the reliability of the usual provided a more surprising result: the key findings: the challenges that measure of child poverty (entitlement there was a strong positive association are faced by the schools and by the to free school meals) that is used in between levels of child poverty and young people; the importance of the research into attainment and the success rate in initial positive role of the key personnel and the achievement of young people in school leaver destinations. Some intervention in the schools. schools. schools with high levels of child There are intelligent and able young We constructed a unique tripartite poverty were very successful in rates people in all of the schools, but many statistical measure of poverty: (1) of initial leaver destinations. children belong to socially challenged entitlement to free school meals, (2) It is important to note that there was families which struggle to support information from the Scottish Index no significant difference in these themselves and help the young people of Multiple Deprivation and (3) results between Catholic schools and in their progress through school. This Staged Intervention (advanced non-denominational schools. As can affect attendance at school and additional professional support is academic researchers in school the concentration levels of the young

14 OPEN HOUSE August 2014 people while at school. The schools the young people through school and that is poorly paid shift work, often at face budget cuts which affect funding help them plan for a positive leaver unsociable hours and with very few for additional support for the young destination. This means engaging with career prospects. people, for example, the funding of children at the primary school. The Third, there is no room for extra time from Careers Officers. The only secondary schools with the indifference towards initial positive schools also face reductions in places necessary resource for this work were school leaver destinations. This is a in Colleges which have been an the two that had funded extra time for social, economic and political issue important destination for many of the the Careers Officers. Other examples that has consequences for the futures young people in the five schools. of intervention include close of the young people as they leave Increased tariffs in Universities monitoring of young people who schools but also for the future of increases pressure on these young demonstrate signs of disengaging or Scottish society. people as they strive to acquire the who are disengaged. Some schools appropriate grades in public have created bespoke in-house leavers Fuller reports on the research can be examinations. Many young people, programmes to support the transition found at: and their families, consider an of the more vulnerable young people McKinney, S.J., Hall, S., Lowden, K., apprenticeship to be one of the best into a leaver destination – some of McClung, M. and Cameron, L. (2012) routes to employment and a these are very focused on practical The relationship between poverty and sustainable future. There have been skills. deprivation, educational attainment few apprenticeship opportunities There is evidence from our research and positive school leaver destinations available, though this has recently that schools are working hard with in Glasgow secondary schools, improved. There are few major external partners to secure initial Scottish Educational Review 44 (1), employers in the locale of the five positive leaver destinations for the 33-45. schools and the schools have targeted young people. The findings, however, McKinney, S.J., Hall, S., Lowden, K., smaller employers to secure must be viewed with some caution. McClung, M. and Cameron, L. (2013) employment for the young people. We wish to make three points about Supporting school leavers in areas of The commitment of the school the findings of our research. deprivation into initial positive school leadership is crucial in facing the First, we have deliberately adopted leaver destinations. Improving Schools challenge to maintain or improve the the qualifying word initial because the 16 (1), 67-83. initial positive school leaver statistics on positive school leaver destinations. In all of the five schools destinations are only applicable for a there was a strong commitment from short period of time. Young people Dr. Stephen J. McKinney is a Senior the school leaders. The difference in can have false starts in Higher and Lecturer in the School of Education, the success rates of the schools lay in Further Education and employment University of Glasgow. He is the the ways in which this commitment and training, or they may be employed leader of the Research and Teaching was put into operation in the schools. on short term contracts. Longitudinal Group, Creativity, Culture and Faith The schools with the higher success research is required to chart the and an associate member of the rates in initial positive school leaver trajectory of young people over an Robert Owen Centre for Educational destinations delegated the operational extended period of time. This would Change. He can be contacted at: responsibility to a member of the provide a better understanding of false [email protected] school staff. These schools also starts, short term contracts and Stuart Hall and Kevin Lowden are managed, in the face of severe progress to more sustainable futures. Senior Researchers and members of financial restraints, to fund extra time The Robert Owen Centre for for the work of the Careers Officers in Second, more detailed information is Educational Change, School of the school. The delegated members of required about the quality of the Education, University of Glasgow. staff have good working relations with positive school leaver destination. A the Careers Officers (and other number of our interviewees expressed Michele McClung is the Principal external partners) and they have serious anxieties about some of the Officer of Planning, Performance and established strong relationships with employment that young people Research and Lauren Cameron is the young people and their families. secured in retailing and catering –low Planning, Performance and Research All of the five schools agreed that level and low skilled work in Officer – both within Education early intervention was vital to support supermarkets, bars and restaurants Services, Glasgow City Council.

August 2014 OPEN HOUSE 15 Catholic schools

THOMAS A FITZPATRICK The age of the laity

A retired vice principal of a Catholic education college responds to questions raised by Open House contributors and highlights the challenge faced by Catholic teachers today.

Shortly before his death the late with the damage caused by the war. associated in many minds with Cardinal Winning, speaking at a By the end of the 20th century some of Nietszche’s proclamation of the ‘Death of Gonzaga Lecture, gave it as his opinion these Religious teaching orders had gone, God’, Willy Slavin asked in his jubilee that this, the 21st century, would be the while those that survived were finding it homily are we to leave it to the century of the laity. He may have been difficult to produce head teachers from humanists and secularists to save the thinking mainly of the situation in their ranks and staff their schools. The world on their own? (Open House 238) Scotland, where there were already signs heavy responsibility of managing the In the same edition Mary Ferguson noted in plenty of things that were to come, schools, providing religious as well as that Pope Francis prayed that the media and especially of the shortage of priests. secular education and preserving their would be instruments in the service of The signs warned of other things. One Catholic essence fell more and more on truth and peace. Surely it is also for men had to do with Catholic schools. For lay teachers, men and women of good and women of good will to look for a almost a century the Catholic community faith. As the number of priests also solution. This is the context which of Scotland had benefitted, at least in the declined, the support they were able to prompted the suggestion (Open House secular sense, from the transfer of its give to the national system, particularly 235) that there is something to be said schools into the national educational in the training and certification of for introducing articles on ‘philosophy’ system. Their catholicity and the place of teachers, also dwindled. into Open House. The root meaning of religious education within the system At the present time Catholic education the word, as many schoolboys and girls were protected by the supervision in Scotland at the practical, most used to know, is ‘love of wisdom’. exercised by the Church, particularly important level – the chalk face – is Once upon a time the role of the over the appointment of teachers, and by almost completely in the hands of the teacher was described as ‘Guide, law in the Education (Scotland) Act of laity. As a result of the dual system which philosopher and friend’. A philosophy 1918. began in 1918 when the parochial that does not aspire to be a mode of life The system flourished in the inter-war schools were ‘transferred’ into the runs the risk of error, or of degenerating years, during which a Catholic secondary national system, teachers have been in into sophistry. That is not the way ahead sector developed. It had grown out of the the unenviable position of having to for the teacher of the new age that is pre-existing parochial, essentially serve two masters, on the one hand to upon us. Instead, his/her focus should be elementary, schools system, and satisfy the Church as to their suitability on ‘wisdom’, and let it be said, on the benefitted greatly from the support of as to faith and morals to be in charge of first syllable of the word philosophy, many Religious teaching orders who set pupils, and on the other to meet the which is ‘love’. the pattern of Catholic education in this academic, moral and even spiritual country. requirements of the State, as Joe Thomas A Fitzpatrick was Vice-Principal Progress was interrupted, some would Fitzpatrick pointed out (Open House of Notre Dame College of Education in say reversed, by World War Two. After 238), preparing successive generations of Glasgow. 1945, when the first atomic bomb was young people to meet the demands of a exploded at Hiroshima and the horrors culture dominated by hedonism and a If you have a view on this or any of the Nazi concentration camps were ‘death of God’ mentality’. other topic in Open House, we’d The question has to be asked, who will exposed , the ‘culture’ of our civilization love to hear from you. Letters for changed. For half a century, rapidly teach the teachers? In the eyes of the the next edition should be sent developing scientific ideas, even faster State, they require to acquire a sufficient by Friday 29th August to editor@ changing technology and more seriously understanding of Science, perhaps openhousescotland.co.uk or by post a confused and confusing mindset in the necessary but not sufficient in the eyes of to Mary Cullen, 66 Cardross Rd, body politic, imposed new burdens on a the Church. Dumbarton G82 4JQ. teaching profession still trying to grapple With regard to the present culture,

16 OPEN HOUSE August 2014 now at Aberdeen University enquire about the role and NOTEBOOK Library, and the development of this functioning of the Columba Trust, collection for the benefit of scholars. which had provided the original Archives symposium The second phase of the funding to establish Columba Supported by the Scottish History symposium examined what the role House as the principal repository Society, in alliance with the Scottish of the academic community might for Scottish Catholic archives, and Catholic Historical Association, the be in assisting the future had sustained its activities until development of the collection, in recently. Scottish Records Association, the terms of widening access through It was agreed to offer help to the Society for Scottish Medieval and processes such as digitisation, which Bishops’ Conference in seeking Renaissance Studies and the would enable scholars worldwide to research funding for a scoping Economic and Social History read documents online. survey of its post-1878 archival Society of Scotland, a one-day An open discussion followed on collections – to establish what is symposium on Scottish Catholic how the academic community and there and who owns it, which Archives – Past, Present, Future? learned societies might best support would be important for developing was held in May at the University a way forward for continued access a longer term strategy. of Dundee. to and preservation of the post- It was also agreed that this should The focus of the symposium was 1878 Scottish Catholic Archives. be combined with a wider scoping the two million post-1878 Scottish Key points of discussion included survey to establish the extent and Catholic Archives, at present still that Scotland’s Catholic archives, character of other collections of located at Columba House in due to a number of historical and Scottish Catholic archival material Edinburgh’s New Town, but with a social factors, had traditionally elsewhere in Scotland. question mark over access and been more centralised than in other storage. countries, and had attracted Scalan pilgrimage Introductory comments from significantly more material than Professor Dauvit Broun, convenor diocesan records alone. The of the Scottish History Society, and majority had largely been stored at Dr Jenny Wormald gave the Columba House and supported by immediate context of the generations of keepers. The current symposium and highlighted the situation has represented a more positive dialogue and retrograde step from this position. general context that had developed The physical state and future over the past few months. capabilities of Columba House in Archbishop’s Cushley’s Edinburgh was discussed: there has Pilgrims at Scalan. representative, Fr Paul Kelly PhD, been a lack of clarity on this issue, former assistant keeper in the and it is still not entirely clear. National Library of Scotland, was There was general agreement that Around 180 people made their way warmly welcomed. the chief priority should be to to Glenlivet to join the annual Four short papers were delivered preserve the current integrity of the pilgrimage to Scalan on 6th July. by Professor Ewen Cameron, Dr post-1878 collections as they stand; Archbishop Conti presided at Karly Kehoe and Dr Darren this did not mean that they should Mass, and the preacher was Fr Tierney. The intention is to combine remain based at Columba House if Michael Briody of the Scalan the papers and publish them in the Columba House proved to be Association. In his sermon he said: Innes Review, the journal of the incapable of continuing as a On Wednesday 6 August, a Mass Scottish Catholic Historical functioning historical archive, but it will be celebrated, at 1.00pm, near Association. The head of Special was agreed that they should to Eilean Bàn, an island on Loch Collections and Libraries at nevertheless remain intact, even if Morar in the Western Highlands, to Aberdeen University, Ms Siobhan moved to another location. It was mark the foundation of the first Convery, completed the first part of noted that this did not necessarily seminary on Scottish soil in the the symposium with a presentation have to be in Edinburgh. year 1714. It had a short life. The on the storage and conservation of In terms of ways forward, it was following year, one of the better the one million Historic Archives, agreed that a first step would be to known Jacobite uprisings took

August 2014 OPEN HOUSE 17 place and failed, and this brought a Here is a description of the Hutters gathering flood of Government soldiers, the circumstances in which Mass was ‘redcoats’, into the Highlands, celebrated about the year 1747, a wreaking widespread punitive few miles north of here, in the destruction. The Church was a aftermath of Bonnie Prince particular target, because it was a Charlie’s 1745 Uprising. These are reasonable assumption that if you boyhood memories written up in were a Catholic, you were also a later life by Bishop John Geddes, Jacobite. The Loch Morar seminary who built the building we have was one among many victims. The come to today. Vicar Apostolic, the redoubtable Over 150 people gathered in Maryhill The priest said Mass in various Bishop James Gordon, looked to his Burgh Hall in Glasgow. places, commonly in barns, and kinsman, the Duke of Gordon, to always in the night-time. Towards The Thousand Huts movement, provide a haven in his lands and so the end of the week, he bespoke responding to popular demand, held the seminary came here to Scalan. some barn that happened to be its first West of Scotland meeting at What were these places for – Loch empty, in a place proper for the a packed gathering in Maryhill Morar and Scalan? They were places Burgh Halls on 12 July. It was where the Mass could be celebrated meeting of the people in the night, chaired by Lesley Riddoch who has safely, most of the time, but in secret. between the approaching Saturday lived in a hut and who wasn’t They were places where boys and and Sunday; and some trusty backward in coming forward with young men were trained to be priests persons were sent to acquaint the her views that we shouldn’t be in Scotland, so that they could heads of the Catholic families of discussing but organising. Ninian ensure that the Sacrifice of the Mass this determination. On Saturday, was not lost to the People of when it was late at night, the Stuart said the door had been Scotland. Why was the Mass being Catholics convened at the appointed opened by the recent report on Land celebrated in secret? Why was there place; after midnight a sermon was Reform which included room for danger of Scotland losing the Mass? made, Mass was said, and all hutting and said there were The answer lies in the decisions of endeavoured to get home before landowners who were interested in including this in their development the Scottish Parliament – the daybreak. These meetings were proposals. Alistair MacIntosh, as previous one – which met in often very inconvenient, from the might be expected, struck a deeper Edinburgh in the year 1560 and badness of the weather and of the note by suggesting we had to get passed the first of the Penal Laws roads, and from the people being beyond thoughts of ‘staycation’ which prohibited the celebration of crowded together without seats; but opportunities. Mass in our country; priests were all was borne with great alacrity There were no fewer than 15 forbidden to be in the country at all, and cheerfulness. They seemed to be and clearly preparing people for the workshops ranging from how to glad to have something to suffer for priesthood was also illegal. build your own hut to how to deal their God and for the profession of The seminaries at Loch Morar with sanitation and energy his holy religion. and Scalan came into being requirements. The bogey wo/men of … What efforts would you make fundamentally to ensure the Planning Permission and Building for the Mass? How far would you continued celebration of Mass in Control are likely to hold their hand travel, how much money would Scotland. The Mass was worth until they see how local authorities everything: existing here at Scalan you spend, how many hours would respond to the light touch regulation in an illegal and clandestine way, you give up just to be sure of being suggested at Holyrood. The risking arrest and violence; living attending Mass at least each Forestry Commission is already out here in the middle of nowhere; Sunday? These are questions which committed to a hutting initiative. being away from home and family; Catholics even in the towns and There was a call from the floor to sharing cramped conditions with cities of Scotland will have to start start a federation for those who people not of your own choosing; asking themselves in the immediate already have hutting experience accepting the horrendous weather future. When all is said and done, (including some who have – most years it was cut off by snow we will surely love the Lord by experienced eviction) and those who for at least a month… loving the Mass he gave us. are ready to try it.

18 OPEN HOUSE August 2014 LETTERS LIVING SPIRIT The Editor of Open House For I am already on the email : [email protected] point of being sacrificed; All correspondence, including email, must give full postal address and telephone number the time of my departure has come. I have fought the good fight, I have of nuclear weapons? Scotland can join Trident and the referendum finished the race, I have the rest of humanity, which wants an ‘The economic situation is by far the kept the faith. Henceforth there is laid up for international treaty prohibiting all main issue in this debate’, writes Andy me the crown of righteousness which the nuclear weapons. This can be our gift to Glen in June’s edition of Open House. Lord, the righteous judge, will award to me While Mr. Glen sits hitting his keyboard, the world. As the redoubtable Bruce Kent said: ‘I am an Englishman, but I on that Day, and not only to me but also to all a young man also sits at a control panel who have loved his appearing. 2 Tim 4:6-8 waiting to launch a nuclear missile and support Scottish independence because it bring the Sun to earth, murdering untold means an end to Trident’. thousands of innocent people. In our The Church of Scotland, the Catholic We cannot ignore the fact that in cities name, and with our consent. Bishops, and leaders of all faith groups human trafficking, the narcotics trade, the Trident is the world’s most powerful have condemned the monstrous evil, as abuse and exploitation of minors, the machine for the mass killing of human have all sections of civil society in abandonment of the elderly and infirm, and beings, and is on patrol in a state of full Scotland. Why then does ‘better various forms of corruption and criminal alert, 24/7. Nearly 200 atom bombs are together’ support it? And why don’t they activity take place. The proclamation of the stored in Coulport, the biggest nuclear at least have the honesty to call Gospel will be a basis for restoring the dignity arsenal in Europe 25 miles from themselves ‘better together with of human life in these contexts for Jesus Glasgow. All the Unionist parties Trident’? desires to pour out an abundance of life upon support Trident, and its replacement in In 1997, addressing the United our cities (cf. John 10:10). The unified and 2025. A No vote means one is saying yes Nations, the Pope’s envoy, Archbishop complete sense of human life that the gospel to Trident. Conversely, all parties supporting Renato Martino declared that: ‘nuclear proposes is the best remedy for the ills of our independence want a written weapons are incompatible with the peace cities even though we have to realise that a constitution with a clause specifically we seek for the 21st century. They uniform and rigid programme is not suited to banning nuclear weapons from Scottish cannot be justified. They deserve this complex reality. But to live our human life land and water. As John Ainslie has condemnation’. to the fullest and to meet every challenges as a demonstrated in his report Trident - The American Archbishop R.G. leaven of Gospel witness in every culture and Nowhere to go, there is simply nowhere Hunthausen said, ‘Our nuclear war in every city will make us better Christians else in the UK that Vanguard submarines preparations are the global crucifixion of and bear fruit in our cities. can operate from other than the existing Jesus. What we do to the least of these, Evangelii Gaudium Chapter 2 (75) Coulport/Faslane complex. Scottish including our nuclear planning, we do to independence therefore means nuclear Jesus. This is his teaching. We cannot Joy and mind. These are not words that you disarmament for the UK, and a dream avoid it, and we should not try. Our would normally put together, but they fulfilled for all who have campaigned nuclear weapons are the final crucifixion against these hellish weapons of mass inspired the eleventh century Richard of St. of Jesus, the extermination of the human Victor, a Scottish canon teaching in Paris, and destruction since the start of the nuclear family with whom he is one’. age. became the themes of his two books on the This is a huge moral responsibility, and Instead of the mean-minded ‘what’s in contemplative mind, Benjamin Minor and a unique opportunity. It will be our it for me?’ attitude of the No campaign, Benjamin Major. The titles are taken from one everlasting shame if we say no to why don’t we consider what we can give obscure passage from Psalm 68:27, where independence and yes to Trident. to the rest of the world, by taking this ‘Benjamin’ is described as leading the huge step towards the global elimination Brian Quail, GLASGOW procession into the temple in mentis excessu, which was translated as ‘with a joyful mind’ A message from the treasurer or ‘with an ecstatic mind’. This made me ask: In September 2015 Open House will produce its 250th edition, a remarkable achievement What might a joyful mind be? for a publication produced on a volunteer basis. To ensure Open House’s continued prosperity we need to increase our subscriber base. When your mind does not need to be right. Although we have a loyal readership and many of you make a donation along with your When you no longer need to compare yourself subscription renewal, this income is unpredictable. with others. If half of our subscribers could enlist one more subscriber then this would cover our When you no longer need to compete – not costs. I would urge you to encourage a friend who you may pass your copy to or who even in your own head. you know would be interested in reading Open House to become a subscriber. When …………… In the coming weeks we will re launch our website where we hope to provide additional content and a mechanism for our overseas friends to make a financial contribution. In From The Naked Now by Richard Rohr. order to develop and prosper we need to secure our revenue base. Next time you’re Crossroad Publishing Company, looking for a gift idea please consider an Open House subscription. Florence Boyle New York, 2013

August 2014 OPEN HOUSE 19 controlling wages locally before they election Churchill wasn’t the only BOOKS took their skills overseas. Colonialism politician seeking a safe seat. Willie was practised at home and abroad. In Gallagher had sought the Labour Empire, Industry and Class Dundee the jute barons found an easy nomination before standing as a Anthony Cox, Routledge 2013. target since the work was more suited Communist. He went on to become to women whose bargaining position MP for West Fife. Scotland’s most Dundee and Empire was not much better than ‘Calcutta influential politician of the 20th coolies’ as they were known. The century, Tom Johnston, became a Jim Tomlinson, Edinburgh Dundee owners even managed to get Dundee MP in 1924 before moving to University Press 2014. exemption from growing Stirling following the fracture with the Parliamentary legislation on the ILP which prolonged Conservative/ Dundee, apart from employment of children. Men were Unionist influence in Scotland. being the place notoriously reduced to being ‘kettle Dundee’s most distinguished citizen where Open House boilers’. Or, disproportionately, joined was Mary Slessor, a mill girl who is was founded, is the Armed Forces although up to 50% still well remembered in also famous for failed the physical test. Nigeria. Politicians found it ‘jute, jam and Trade Union leaders struggled in notoriously difficult to manage the journalism’. This both outposts with Dundee labour predominantly female work force who mantra masks the organisers visiting Bengal to inspect were loathe to join Trade Unions but reality that Dundee working conditions there. One were liable to strike immediately at was the first UK difficulty they found in the east was perceived injustices. One of the most city fettered by the managers’ ability to play off prominent of them, Mary Brooksbank, unbridled Hindus against Muslims. In this was eventually expelled from the capitalism and respect it is interesting that Dundee, Communist Party, dismissed as ‘just ae consequent poverty, although it had a significant Irish traces of which Catholic population, mostly escaped wee woman’. One person who remain today. Its sectarianism. This is put down to the succeeded in forming a Trades Union ‘success’ stemmed fact that the majority of immigrants was a Church of Scotland minister, from its seaboard were single women. Biographies of Henry Williamson. Another minister, location with a Winston Churchill are coy about his Walter Walsh, had in 1907 written a route to the jewel of the British 14 years as the Liberal (the business book called Jesus in Juteopolis in Empire, India. Narayanganj, seaport party) MP for Dundee from 1908 until which Jesus questioned the mill of Dacca (Dhaka) in East Bengal he was ousted in 1922 by the owners and ended up being thrown (Bangladesh), was known as the Temperance candidate ‘Neddy’ into the Tay. Dundee of the East. From there was Scrimegeour. The Greatest Living The sad fact is that the jute industry transported jute to be spun and woven Englishman, known in Dundee by a rose on the back of the Crimean War into cloth and sacking in the Dundee number of pejorative terms, then and its best times coincided with the of the West. became a Tory again. Boer War and the First and Second In 1980 one of the first contacts with Just as Empire protected ‘remote’ World Wars. Its most profitable year the Scottish Bishops’ Justice and Peace Dundee so its collapse left the city as was 1919. This was also the time of Commission was William Walker, a exposed as Calcutta. The owners of the greatest male unemployment with Dundee worker who had come late to the Lochee Mills, Keiller’s Marmalade men returning from war with the academic life and who had just had his and the Sunday Post gave Dundee a consequent depression of wages and a doctoral thesis published under the certain philanthropic inheritance but housing crisis. At the end of the day title of Juteopolis. This pioneering they invested their profits at a safe Dundee became a victim of Empire work of Walker’s on labour in Dundee remove in overseas projects especially because it was a small card in the and Bengal has now been taken railroads in North America. In Bengal game being played out between Indian further by Anthony Cox of Dundee the most common reason for industrial Nationalists and London. Its fate was University in his Empire, Industry and disputes was high-handed eventually decided by plastic, a Class: The Imperial Nexus of Jute mistreatment by Scottish managers by-product of the oil industry. When 1840-1940. In the current crisis of which included the abuse of I was in Bangladesh in the 1970s capitalism the unasked question is: women. In the Independence debate Dundee was still selling spare parts for ‘where are the workers?’ They are no we should remember the part played machinery in the jute mills there. In longer our relatives and in the management of Empire by 1999 a boat from Bangladesh sailed neighbours. Their labour is sweated Byron’s ‘liberty hating Scotch’. Did away with the last piece of the now in faraway places with strange they see themselves as Johnny come equipment which Dundee had lived off sounding names. It may be convenient latelies who had to do more to make for more than a century. to forget them. The history of Dundee their presence felt? is therefore instructive. Tomlinson, also a resident of Willy Slavin Cox endeavours to show that the Dundee, covers the same period with a (Both these books are available for Scots of Empire were well practiced in greater focus on the UK. In the1922 borrowing from the Arts Editor)

20 OPEN HOUSE August 2014 sometimes naively reassure ourselves. FILM Keeping this in mind we can now identify a fairly consistent two-part Under the Skin (DVD, Blu-Ray) storyline. The first half deals with her hunter-gatherer excursions in a white Directed by: Jonathan Glazer van. Here the real stars are the totally Starring: Scarlett Johansson, Jeremy gallus Glasgow guys. The magnificent McWilliams, Lynsey Taylor Mackay. front and entitlement of their unscripted performances is hilarious. Most men would not consider being At other times however, her luck runs kidnapped by Scarlet Johansson the out and at one point she barely stuff of nightmares. In fact, even if the escapes a baying mob of Bucky hidden agenda of this Sci-Fi horror is fuelled predators who interpret her revealed (that she is a murderous indifference as the supreme act of femme-fatal alien intent on pulverising aggression. their flesh into rocket fuel) one suspects Yet everything changes in the middle many would still take a chance. That of the film with a truly mesmerising this proves to be the case provides the ten minute encounter with a facially plot-line of probably the most surreal disfigured man played with heart- to as sickness and treatable only in portrayal of Glasgow life ever to hit the breaking honesty by Adam Pearson, an response to a plethora of co-morbid screens. actor who suffers from symptoms. neurofibromatosis. Johansson warms Yet what if she had strayed into a to his non-possessive attentiveness and, church, would she have felt better and piercing the cult of beauty, she helps understood more? Rowan Williams him explore his need to be touched, laments that what she may have heard held, to feel … human. In giving she would be ‘a hermetically sealed receives and, now increasingly dialect… or a version of the tired and sensitised, the second-half of the film empty language of the politics in the sees her fleeing the city and wandering world around’. Instead of simply in the wilderness. Here, although preserving the past he promotes a enchanted by natural beauty, she re-awakening of Christian discernment. Ms Johansson takes a tumble, encounters the same mix of fleeting This new ‘tonality of being’, far from a ploy used to draw men to her compassion and abhorrent cruelty. Her desensitising, asks for a deeper hungry alien character. increasingly pained expression questioning of the stimuli coming in. suggesting that now she is thinking and Yet perhaps going further than the Just to re-cap on the story; Johansson apparently as confused as the rest of us. medical model it offers a restructuring is an alien sent to earth to take on a So what can we take from this film? around what faith teaches is the most human skin and lure itinerant men - Well, the challenging suggestion is that profound prompting, namely the word mostly Celtic supporters - back to her the vulnerability and bafflement of the of God. His vision supports an almost lair (a decrepit council house in the east poor alien mirrors a sizeable portion of poetic disposition highly attuned to the end) to be re-processed into sludge Glasgow citizens. This can be better impulses of new life and away from biomass. Now here’s the truly understood by considering Lesley ‘dead words and false acts’. Indeed unbelievable bit - the film actually Riddoch’s assertion in ‘Blossom does not the ‘alien’s’ experience of the works! Somehow on the level of a – What Scotland Needs to Flourish’ disfigured man present such a new modern parable of alienation it that ‘hopeless, done- in communities ‘word of God’, demonstrating as it discloses a beautiful human story and and profoundly unequal life chances does a fundamental innocence and still manages to posit some disturbing are Public Enemy Number One and openness to experience? questions about our own fair city. Two’. She notes Harry Burns, It took an alien to expose the The film was met with almost Glasgow’s former Chief Medical challenges of living in a human skin in universal acclaim. However, most of Officer’s favoured view that adult our city. That she found no room at the the London critics focused on the health is essentially a matter of inn and limped towards a tragic inscrutable blankness of Johansson’s coherence; namely, the degree to which conclusion is sobering. Empathy, expression; the hook being the lack of the various stimuli we receive (under nourished by faith, remains the most any clue as to her thinking. For me this the skin ) are expressed in profound stimuli around which we is an error and the key to the film is in environments that are ‘structured, should structure our experience. what she is feeling, particularly in predictable and explicable’. Basically, if Without its rekindling ‘Planet Glasgow’ response to the completely baffling we can’t make sense of our world or could easily spiral into an orbit reality of Glasgow life. Remember she have no desire to engage then our incomprehensible to the rest of the has just taken on a human skin and health will suffer. Now back in the known universe. carries none of the baggage of cultural sixties we used call this ‘alienation’ but myth (Smiles Better!) with which we in an a-political landscape it is referred Jim Hart

August 2014 OPEN HOUSE 21 The album brims with love for the current trend of ‘folk’ music as niche MUSIC depopulated valleys where Chisholm consumer entertainment. In an age of grew up, and from which so many increasingly slick, virtuoso ‘folk’ DUNCAN CHISHOLM people were cleared and shipped to musicians, it’s a pleasant change to Live At Celtic Connections another continent. The soul of this encounter performers like the music is akin to Klezmer, which also McCalmans who manage to totally Copperfish Records, CPFCD006. expresses the pain of expulsion and engage their audiences, not just exile. Chisholm’s fiddle hits the same entertain them. This ‘live’ album heartstrings as a slow nigun or doina consists of performances in local played by Isaac Stern or Itzhak venues: village halls, theatres and folk Perlman. Like Klezmer, this music does clubs across Scotland. People of all more than evoke a traditional rural ages, from six to 96, have attended the culture: it also speaks of that culture’s McCalmans’ shows and you can hear catastrophic collision with history. the audiences on this album joining in Even the dance tunes are tinged with with the singing (and they didn’t even sadness. Like the klezmorim, Chisholm know they were being recorded!). is a master of the slow air, and he Listening to this infectious album, I draws every drop of emotion out of wonder how many of today’s young each soulful note. Chisholm is keenly academy-trained ‘traditional’ musicians aware that the violin is the instrument would touch the McCalmans’ that most closely resembles the human repertoire. The McCalmans sing in voice, and in all his music he tries to defence of asylum seekers, they sing mimic the human voice as much as he openly sentimental ballads, they even can. His fiddle’s long, sustained notes sing comedy songs. Ian McCalman has tremble and shudder like a human Chisholm is a Scottish traditional a talent for composing comic songs, voice sobbing with emotion. Try, for fiddler, famous for his work with The and this album contains some of his instance, Caoineadh Johnny Sheain Julie Fowlis Band, and for his trilogy of best. (Let’s Recycle is a humorous solo albums ‘Farrar’, ‘Canaich’ and Jeaic/Nuair Bhios Mi Leam Fhin. The fiddle is so powerfully empathetic, it is rewrite of Midlothian Council’s ‘Affric’ which are musical portraits of Recycling instruction booklet!) the three glens of Strathglass where difficult to listen without weeping. www.duncanchisholm.com Nick Keir is also a fine songwriter, Chisholm’s family roots run seven whose songwriting style is centuries deep. The glens are beautiful impressionistic, vivid and yearningly but desolate places as a result of the McCALMANS romantic. On this album Nick’s song clearances of the Highland Gaelic Coming Home (Live) Corryvreckan Calling is the true story people that took place in the 18th and Greentrax, CDTRAX336. of an Edinburgh girl’s ambition to 19th centuries. escape from a grim Edinburgh estate to This live album completes Chisholm’s a better life in the Hebrides. Strathglass project. In his own words: The most memorable song on this ‘The Strathglass Suite is based on my album has to be the rousingly last three albums - making an performed title track. Coming Home orchestral arrangement around a core offers Scottish identity to the world’s traditional band of six. The project refugees as their fundamental right. required a fitting conclusion, where Listening to this recording, it is those cinematic episodes I had impossible not to be deeply moved by imagined could really come to life. The the sound of people of all ages in a answer lay in expanding the small rural community singing along to arrangements from the trilogy with an these words: orchestral section of strings and brass to give the music a wide screen Put a light in the window, your brother’s panorama and create a special concert coming home, that would do justice to the project as a The McCalmans trio have been Set a meal on the table, your brother’s whole’. performing traditional Scottish coming home, Accompanying on this album are material and their own songs since Coming home to a place he’s never been, Jarlath Henderson (uilleann pipes/ 1964 and this is their 27th album. coming home to a land he’s never seen, whistles), Matheu Watson (guitar), They consist of three vocalists, three Coming home to a family he has never Allan Henderson (piano/fiddle), Ross guitars, and great audience rapport. known, Hamilton (bass), Martin O’Neill They have been around for so long that All Jock Tamson’s Bairns are coming (bodhran). The 15-strong string and their signature close harmony-singing home. brass ensemble are led by violinist Greg has come right back into fashion! Lawson. The McCalmans stand out from the www.greentrax.com

22 OPEN HOUSE August 2014 HANNEKE CASSEL Dot the Dragon’s Eyes is Hanneke Originally from Edinburgh, folk-jazz Cassel’s fifth solo album. A Berklee harpist Maeve Gilchrist spent four Dot The Dragon’s Eyes graduate in violin performance, formative years learning jazz and Cassel Records, HJC2013. Hanneke plays and composes fiddle improvisation at Berklee College of music in the Scottish and Cape Music. 20 Chandler Street (her fourth MAEVE GILCHRIST Breton traditions, infusing both with album) is a loving tribute to the City of the fruit of her musical life Boston’s music scene. Produced by 20 Chandler Street Väsen’s Roger Tallroth, the album was Adventure Music, AMA10852. experience. She tours regularly with Baroque group Ensemble Galilei, has recorded live with a core band that lived and taught in Shanghai and includes Duncan Wickel (fiddle), Aidan O’Donnell (bass) and Roger Tallroth worked with street children in Kenya. (guitar). Fiddler Darol Anger (who As on her previous album, she is produced Maeve’s 2011 album Song of accompanied here by a range of Delight) is a guest musician. excellent musicians including Rushad The stirring traditional pipe tune In Eggleston (cello) Jeremy Kittel (fiddle, and Oot the Harbour is given a viola), Mike Block (cello), Keith surging, sparkling rendition on harp Murphy (guitar) and Dave Wiesler that is worthy of Alan Stivell in his (piano). pomp. The ancient Scottish ballad Twa Almost all the tunes here are Corbies is given a shimmering Hanneke’s, many of them composed arrangement for harp, fiddle, guitar and for the weddings of friends and bass. Maeve preludes it atmospherically family. Hanneke’s compositions treat with GS MacLennan’s Little Cascade us to thrilling chromatic modulations and then she dramatically shifts into and vibrant harmonies, for example the Breton tune An Alarc’h, to which in Jig For Christina and the klezmer- Twa Corbies is always sung. Maeve’s flavoured The Important Thing. In lower-register, husky vocal is well- compositions such as The Captain suited to the Twa Corbies’ darkly- and Katrina McCoy’s Jig/Girls of poetic meditation on the vanity of this Mudzini Kwetu, the contrast of world and the impermanence of all urgent, driving cello and soaring, things. legato, yearnful fiddle will remind Over half the pieces here are Maeve’s many of the work of Alasdair Fraser own compositions, such as the bright, modern jazz-jig Sandhunter, or the and Natalie Haas, with whom luminous February Bright with its Hanneke has been a frequent limpid, plangent, semi-classical quality. collaborator over the years. Dianne’s Her loping rhythmic piece The Waltz is a gorgeous, wistful Explorer takes us on a mellow road composition for fiddle, piano, cello trip across America. and trumpet – it would make an Maeve’s warm, sensual, catchy song Here are two albums and two young evocative film soundtrack. Religulous City In The North deserves to be women who are taking Scottish and Eliana Grace are sweetly adopted by singers in Northern cities traditional music into exciting new poignant compositions, like graceful everywhere. Beguilingly sung in her directions. Both women are products string quartets, with excitingly low, bluesy Edinburgh voice, it is - quite of the richly diverse culture of the unpredictable melodies that weave literally- bluegrass with a Scottish City of Boston, and of Berklee delightfully through light and shade. accent. College of Music in particular. They (Hanneke dedicates Religulous to www.adventure-music.com Richard Dawkins ‘for reminding me owe something to the influence of Paul Matheson fiddler Darol Anger and the music- of the greatness of our risen saviour and creator’). without-borders philosophy of Reviewers Windham Hill. Both artists use their The Marathon (For Boston) is an mastery of Scottish traditional music energetic strathspey. Composed on Jim Hart is a househusband and the night of the 2013 Boston as a springboard to explore other member of the Oneir men’s bombing, it successfully conveys the forms of music (americana, new age spirituality group. shock and nervous restlessness of that jazz, and western classical), which Paul Matheson is an equality and night. The whole album is richly- has led them to create sophisticated, diversity advisor for the police and a textured, elegantly expressive and varied and complex musical hybrids music reviewer. rewards repeated listening. that still retain a traditional Scottish Willy Slavin is a retired parish priest. frisson. www.hannekecassel.com

August 2014 OPEN HOUSE 23 Moments in time OPEN HOUSE We set off from Butterflies are on the wing and the Board members: the village of yellow flowers of tormentil line the Florence Boyle (Treasurer); Furnace on the path. We cross a deep burn on a Ian Fraser; Elizabeth Kearney; shores of Loch Jim McManus (Chair); modern timber bridge and descend Jennifer Stark; Michael Turnbull. Fyne in Argyll. a steep hill through birch woodland. Furnace is Editorial advisory group: This is a quiet area and we have named after the Linden Bicket; Charles Gay; Honor met no one since we set out; the iron ore furnace which was built in Hania; Lynn Jolly; only houses are on the other side of 1755; the ruins of the old stone Willy Slavin. building, covered in vegetation, the valley, but years ago this was a Editor: Mary Cullen [email protected] reminds me of pictures of ancient busy place with charcoal burners, Arts editor: Lynn Jolly Byzantine churches. We climb out drovers and farmers all passing [email protected] of the village past the still working nearby. We meet the main road and Open House is published ten times granite quarry on to a track, which take a short path through grassland a year. We welcome letters and takes us along a hillside recently to the old village of Auchendrain. contributions, which should be cleared of forest. This is known as This was the last surviving sent to the editor by the last the Galloping Brae on the old road traditional Highland township and Friday of the month before which lead to Loch Fyne; the publication. Articles should be no was once home to over seventy present one is hidden by trees in the more than 1200 words long, and people. When the last resident valley to our left. reviews no more than 800 words. moved away in 1967, the scattered Letters and articles may be edited or A short detour leads to the Wolf held over for future editions. Stone, which is a massive boulder in buildings became a museum, which The opinions and ideas expressed an area of dense forest, where gives a fascinating insight into the by all our contributors are their time when subsistence farming with reputedly the last wolf in Argyll was own and not accepted as those of killed in the early eighteenth a strong sense of community was Open House. century, howling to the moon. This the way of life for many people in All correspondence about the is an atmospheric place; we climb the Highlands. content of Open House to the editor: on to the top of the stone, then Mary Cullen, 66 Cardross Rd, walk round the base. The vegetation Tim Rhead Dumbarton G82 4JQ is still damp after a recent shower Tim Rhead is a pastoral assistant in tel: 07909 594797 but the sun is now shining. the Episcopal Church. www.openhousescotland.co.uk SUBSCRIBE!

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